Welcoming the Holy Spirit Stephen Seamands cracks open the mysteries of the
Holy Spirit.
A charge to keepStanley R. Copeland testfies to the peaceful witness of Bill Hinson.
Ruth Graham: The X-factor Terry Mattingly pays tribute to Ruth Bell Graham.
Darwin & Damascus: Forks in the road to enlightenmentElizabeth Glass maps out a response to the latest
prophets of atheism.
Pithy and persuasive: G.K. Chesterton’s writing still inspires Mary
Jacobs welcomes the colorful Catholic to the table.
Einstein’s search for God Steve Beard gives voice to the relativity
and religion of a genius.
God’s school of prayer Margaret Therkelsen reveals the Spirit’s tutorials in life-changing prayer.
COLUMNS
Next Generation Systemic thinking: Youth ministry as wind chime
RENEW Women’s Network Reclaiming the Wesleyan social witness: Offering
Christ
The Great Commission Hope for a recovering suburbanite
From the Heart The rest of the story
Annual conferences focus on starting new churches
Holsinger faces challenges on United Methodist involvement
Good News board has conversation with Bishops Jones and Dyck
Worldwide Methodism grows by one million per year
Culture in View
Amazing Grace
It seems strange to think of wind chimes as a metaphor for youth ministry programming, but the parallels are intriguing. When wind chimes are hung carefully, and in proper balance, the notes blend together. But when the chimes are hung carelessly or out of balance, there will likely be a malfunction. There may be a sound, but it will be cacophonous-disharmony where there was intended to be harmony-or monotonous, with one note where there was intended to be many. Each chime must be sounded to strike the proper chord.
Like a wind chime, any youth ministry program will entail several different components: programs for outreach, programs for nurture, programs for leadership. Each of these elements of the program is essential. If any one of them is missing in a program, the result can be monotony (stagnation) or disharmony (lack of unity among the people or the programs involved). And they must be in proper balance: a program with all outreach and little nurture leads to a large, shallow ministry; a program of all nurture with little outreach can breed a small, ingrown ministry. And, most important, like a wind chime, where there is no wind, there is no melody. Even the most dynamic youth ministry program, in and of itself, offers nothing if there is not blowing through it the fresh wind of God's Spirit.
The balance and interdependency of these various elements of a youth ministry program is best described as a system of relationships. Thinking about youth ministry programs in this way is called systemic thinking.
What insights relevant for youth ministry programming can be gained from the discipline of systemic thinking? We'll look at a few over the next few issues of Good News. Let's begin with this one:
We need to see each facet of the youth ministry program as interconnected. Individual elements of a program may be complementary, competitive, synergistic, or even destructive. Thinking of the program as a system of interconnected elements prevents one facet of the program from working against another.
. The discipleship program may be so demanding, or so insular, that it isolates the committed students from the very students they need to reach for Christ.
. The overall youth ministry programming environment may be so packed and busy that it actually prevents active students from building a healthy relationship with their families.
. Systemic issues can play out in other ways as well. Many of those who read this column are familiar with the para-church ministry Young Life, a ministry designed to reach unchurched teenagers. It's a wonderful ministry, but their small group ministry, Campaigners, meets in some communities on Sunday night, precluding students from being involved in local church youth ministries. Young Life has always said its goal was to reach teenagers so that they could be plugged into a local church, but their own programming may make it impossible for some students.
Even within a single meeting or ministry event, wise programming seeks to consider how the individual elements combine to build a unified whole. For example, I've spoken at countless weekend retreats where the Saturday night schedule looked something like this:
7:30 - 9:00 Large Group Meeting: Session #3
9:15 - 9:45 Cabin Time/Small Groups
10:00 - 12:00 Dance
Now, I'm not anti-dance per se. But when I hang out in the room during these dances, I see much that encourages just the opposite ethos from what was created earlier in the evening session. One has to ask: are these elements of the program in harmony? Maybe yes, maybe no. But more often than not, my own observation of these dances is that they sound a completely different chord than the one that was struck by the earlier session.
I recall speaking at one weekend event during which the Saturday morning schedule offered a camp-wide forum on sex and dating. The intent of the session was to look at some of these issues from the standpoint of a Christian worldview. The session took place as scheduled, there was a time of question and answer, and then the group dismissed. But, as the group dismissed, the person running the sound cranked up some "walk out" music. The problem was that the "walk out" music was a song that celebrated (blatantly) just the opposite of the values we had been discussing in the session. The last thing students heard as they walked out of that meeting was a message that completely disregarded the message of the meeting. Was the music fun to listen to? Yes. Did the students seem to enjoy the music? Yes. Was it counter-productive to play that music? Absolutely.
Wise programming decisions begin by recognizing that every chime must be held in balance to maintain the proper harmony.
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